Understanding how personal finance works is of course fun and entertaining and teaches us a lot about money in general. But just understanding a topic does not mean that you can also apply your knowledge to your own life. Therefore, you usually do not only have to get the financial knowledge, which you are getting right now by reading this blog, but you also have to implement your newly acquired knowledge into your everyday life.

Spending habits are a very important part of becoming a financial unicorn and a good starting point to implement your newly gained knowledge into your life. Changing existing behaviour is never easy and usually even the hardest part of the whole process of becoming a financial unicorn. That is why it is a good idea to start now, today with it. Not tomorrow or next year but now and for the rest of your life. Let us take a look at one behavioral change that you can implement today and you will profit immediately.

If you buy things that cost lots of money (more than 100 EUR), it is usually a good idea to tackle the situation with certain behavioral steps.

Step 1: Think hard about the item. Do you really need it today or can you also think about it a day later or a week later? Also, even if you buy it today would you have it immediately or anyway have to wait some days until you get it? So what is the point of buying it today then if there will be anyway some days without it? This first step is putting the requirement of the new item into perspective and delaying the purchase.

Step 2: One day later think again about it. Maybe you already forgot it so that is it. Because you forgot it, it was not important anyway. There you go! You just saved a ton of money.

Step 3: If you are still looking into the purchase, search the web. Maybe you can find a better offer.

Step 4: Search similar items that might also fulfill your needs. Especially, if you invest some time to do so and rethink why you wanted to buy the item.

Step 5: Now if you still think that you need the item and it is worth more than saving the money to have a 4-fold buying power later on or a current dividend income stream that is higher than your current one, you can buy the item.

The aim of this behavior is to save more money while still being able to buy things that you really need. In the long run, thinking hard about big things that you buy will ensure that you will save money. And even if you anyway had to buy the item, because you really needed it, the delayed gratification has a benefit in itself. Some people even say that waiting itself is healthy. If that is true or not you can decide yourself. But no matter what, using the delayed spending method (which I maybe should trademark because I never heard of it anywhere else) is definitely part of becoming a financial unicorn and will simplify and speed up your path to your personal financial freedom.